Student Speech and the First Amendment: Two Supreme Court Cases and Their Legacies

Almost fifty years after several Des Moines students were suspended for wearing black armbands to protest the Vietnam War, John and Mary Beth Tinker are returning to Iowa to discuss free-speech rights and the landmark U.S. Supreme Court decision in their case, Tinker vs. Des Moines. Mary Beth Tinker will be joined by Cathy Kuhlmeier Frey, one of three students who thirty years ago sued their Missouri school district after their principal cut stories about pregnancy and divorce from their high school newspaper. The Hazelwood vs. Kuhlmeier decision tempered Tinker by allowing administrators to consider the "valid educational purpose" of speech. Mike Hiestand, a former staff attorney for the Student Press Law Center, will moderate. First Amendment Days